From Wehrmacht to Bundeswehr

[PiretBCN]

Have a walk through some large German city of your choice and you will see against what.

A lot of us will not visit any "large German cities" in the nearest future. Who/what is the enemy of Germany the Bundeswehr should attack in your opinion?

[mezsat2]

Given the current situation in Ukraine, it may be wise to transform the Bundeswehr back into the Wehrmacht.

It would be wise for the German government to cobble together at least a couple of panzerarmees and acquire
or construct large volumes of all manner of missiles, drones, advanced radar, and attack aircraft.

A large force of unterseabooten will be required as well. I would add that the U-Boats would likely be needed
in the SE Asia theatre to help counter Chinese aggression per NATO mandates. Black Sea operations would have
to go with Turkey's approval, of course.

[Adam Carr]

I think Chancellor Scholz has announced that Germany will now do just that. When this thread was written (2008-13) there was no military threat to German or European security. Now there is, in the shape of Putin's fascist regime. Under Merkel the Bundeswehr was allowed sadly to run down, and now it must be become a real army again. I doubt a fleet of U-boats could be built in time to be useful against Putin. By the time they are launched, his Potemkin regime will have long ago collapsed. You may be right about Taiwan, but NATO's remit does not extend to East Asia. Germany's money would be better employed helping Taiwan beef up its defences.

[mezsat2]

Correct on many points, sir. What is difficult to overcome from the German perspective is their now paucity of
fossil fuel resources due, obviously, to Vlad II. Diplomacy and intelligence are of the utmost importance right now.

The EU will need some careful maneouvering to get vital stocks of oil and gas flowing in from Africa. Lybia, firstly,
must be stabilized to allow the maximum production and free flow of petroleum products across the Mediterranean
into Italy. The Saudis are adopting a hawkish stance overall, so I wouldn't look for much aid from there. Iraq is still
a mess.

I guess my main point is that to get the EU up to snuff militarily, it's going to need oil and gas from Africa and the
the Middle East. Shipping from the US is, at best, inefficient and self-limiting.

[Sheldrake]

My 2p. I served in the British Army for ten years in the 1980s, spending six of those years in Germany.

As a young officer my unit was inspected by Commander AFCENT - General Ferdinand von Senger und Etterlin. He had lost an arm at Stalingrad and advised our OP party to "Dig Deeper". We occasionally worked with the Bundeswehr, who seemed most professional. British military thinker Jim Storr claims, in Battlegroup, that the Bundeswehr had far superior tactics to the British and US Armies for defeating those of the Warsaw Pact.

The Federal Republic of Germany was very keen to distance itself from ther Nazi regime. However, lots of Imperial and Wehrmacht symbols and traditions seeped through into the Bundeswehr, along with the soldiery.

The headquarters of the German artillery barracks in Muenster had a series of pictures and photographs commemorating the artillery units raised in the local area over history - including those from the two world wars.

Most Bundeswehr Officers are fasmiliar with some old songs. The Pioneers still sing Argonnerwald and many know "Death in Flanders". At an international Remembrance event at a German War Cemetary on the Somme in 2016 the professional head of the German Army read Walter Flex's "Wild Geese Rushing" (He had to read it because the British band did not have the music for this iconic German marching song). The Bundeswehr's parachute troops still unofficially sing songs commeorating victories at Narvik, Rotterdam and Crete. I occasionally work with a highly decorated retired Bundeswehr paratrooper who is very familiar with all this stuff. He is a popular driver for American groups and a useful reminder that WW2 was a long time ago, and modern Germany is a NATO ally. He was awarded his country's highest award for gallantry under command of the 82nd US Airborne Division in Afghanistan. An interesting dicusssion point at the Iron Mike memorial in Normandy.


As a battlefield historian I have worked with members of the German Commission for Military History, as you can see from this video I made on Staff Ride 2018.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hchJCH ... ankBaldwin
[/youtube]
This topic does come up occasionally. I recall such a discussion over a bottle of Grouse. In recent years the FRG has been cracking down on symbols of the third Reich, confiscating anything with Nazi connections. This led to arguments along the lines of "Thats a picture of a Nazi officer, we are havign that" "No that is my father, its a family photo"

A friend of mine commanded one of the units that was directly ytransferred from the Wehrmacht to a post war army: The British not the Bundeswehr. This was a tranport unit 632 MCTG (Mobile Civilian Transport Group), that had been formed as the transport column for a Parachute Corps and co-opted under British command in 1945 to supply German PW. Like all British native units it had a British CO and handful of key staff e.g. Quartermaster. The CO's office showed the "Stammline" of the unit to Wehrmacht times. The Staffsuperintendents and superindents were German Officers and NCOs, some of which could trace their service to WW2. Reunion dinners were full of comments such as "I haven't seen you snce Kursk"

THe British Army of the Rhine also had a second set of locally raised organisations the Military Service Organisations (MSO) these were similar but raised from Displaced Persons, including discharged Polish servicemen from the wartime Polish Army. In the 1980s British tank transporters were being driven by the veterans of the Polish Armoured Division. Not people to mix with the Gwerman MCTGs.

[Adam Carr]

In response to Mezsat2 above: You are right that Germany needs more energy capacity if it is carry through the massive rearmament programme it now needs, not to mention meeting the needs of Ukraine and other frontline states. But Germany, like the rest of us, needs to end its reliance on fossil fuels as fast as possible. Since Germany's climate does not lend itself to the generation of much solar power, its transition to renewables is going to be slow, difficult and expensive. So the only way Germany can hope to meet its energy needs in the next decade or so is with nuclear power. Scholz should immediately reverse Merkel's stupid decision to shut down Germany's nuclear plants, and indeed should commission new ones, as Japan is now doing

[mezsat2]

For Adam, yes, Germany can't move fast enough away from fossil fuels. The problem is time. They need mass rearmament now to meet Putin's threat. The energy transition (especially nuclear) will take many years. In the interim, they may have to go back to a heavy reliance on coal and synthetic products.

Stoltenberg has publicly stated that if the Russians cause a major "accident" at Zaporizhzhia, Article 5 will automatically be in effect since fallout will presumably kill citizens in NATO countries. This could happen at any moment. I don't think nukes would be involved, but who knows? I'm actually surprised Russia has not hit Ukraine with an EMP weapon, although their calculus is this would probably hinder Russian forces just as much as those of Ukraine.

I believe NATO's single objective in Ukraine would be to simply drive Russia out. It wouldn't take nukes to accomplish that, but Europe would need to be almost completely energy self-sufficient and also strengthen its military forces simultaneously since Putin will probably prepare forces for another attack. Also, the U.S. could potentially be heavily committed in S.E. Asia in the near future (along with Japan, S. Korea, Taiwan, Australia, etc.) and be unable to provide the level of assistance to the EU currently in progress.

[Aida1]

In response to Mezsat2 above: You are right that Germany needs more energy capacity if it is carry through the massive rearmament programme it now needs, not to mention meeting the needs of Ukraine and other frontline states. But Germany, like the rest of us, needs to end its reliance on fossil fuels as fast as possible. Since Germany's climate does not lend itself to the generation of much solar power, its transition to renewables is going to be slow, difficult and expensive. So the only way Germany can hope to meet its energy needs in the next decade or so is with nuclear power. Scholz should immediately reverse Merkel's stupid decision to shut down Germany's nuclear plants, and indeed should commission new ones, as Japan is now doing

Germany has had since many years a detailed plan for the transition to renewable energy since the decision was made to stop nuclear energy.

[Adam Carr]

This is getting off-topic, but the short response is that the "Energiewende" has been an expensive failure. Germany tried to get out of both coal and nuclear simultaneously, relying on Russian gas to tide it over until renewables were ready to take over. But the panicked shut-down of nuclear after Fukushima pushed industry back to using coal, so that Germany's emissions have gone up. Renewables are nowhere near ready to take over, and Russian gas is no longer a safe option. Germans now have higher energy bills and no energy security in the coming winter. Ironically, Germany now has to import electricity from France, generated by France's clean, safe and reliable nuclear industry.

[mezsat2]

I originally mislabeled my post to transform the Bundeswehr into the Wehrmacht. I simply meant in terms of strength, not political ideologies in any sense.

In terms of energy, yes, Germany will unfortunately need to reactivate most of it's remaining CO2 belching coal plants to get through this crisis. Putin is completely insane distributing Soviet flags in occupied areas of Ukraine. His regime is far removed from that one, and even Khrushchev's. A neo-Stalinism is the best comparison, although I wouldn't be shocked if he were to roll out "The Internationale" to his deluded citizenry.

His regime is as far from Communism as is possible. Rule by the few- starve and kill everyone else. His regime is simply a right wing authoritarian dictatorship- no long term ideology beyond Putin exists.

[Urmel]

Ironically, Germany now has to import electricity from France, generated by France's clean, safe and reliable nuclear industry.

That's actually factually wrong. France is now reduced to importing German (and British) electricity because its nuclear industry is a reliability joke, not reliable.

https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten ... seit-1996/

https://www.energylivenews.com/2022/07/ ... d-quarter/

https://www.ans.org/news/article-3939/f ... shutdowns/

https://www.dw.com/en/french-nuclear-pl ... a-62806646

We shouldn't uncritically repeat false information. This is as true in current affairs as it is in history.